And speaking of Matthew Yglesias, here he points out of the the structural flaws in the American democracy:

Most countries separate the role of head of state (symbol of national unity) from that of head of government (practical formulator of policy). Think of the United Kingdom with its queen and its prime minister, or Israel with its president (head of state) and prime minister (leader of the government). In the United States, however, the roles are fused into the office of the president, who is called upon to be both the country's emotional center and the designer of policy responses -- meaning that when tragedies are to be commemorated, there is no nonpartisan figurehead to parade in front of the cameras

The result is that the President (or, in the current case, the person resident in the White House) becomes the repository of the nation's emotional responses, which leads to things like Bush's approval ratings jumping up to very high levels after 9/11, on the basis of nothing more than a couple of televised p.r. events and a half-decent speech before Congress. People really needed to believe that we had a leader at the helm, and they allow themselves to see in Bush attributes and abilities that clearly were not (and are not) there.

If you read unfutz at least once a week, without fail, your teeth will be whiter and your love life more satisfying.

If you read it daily, I will come to your house, kiss you on the forehead, bathe your feet, and cook pancakes for you, with yummy syrup and everything.

(You might want to keep a watch on me, though, just to avoid the syrup ending up on your feet and the pancakes on your forehead.)

Finally, on a more mundane level, since I don't believe that anyone actually reads this stuff, I make this offer: I'll give five bucks to the first person who contacts me and asks for it -- and, believe me, right now five bucks might as well be five hundred, so this is no trivial offer.